This category contains boards that can be programmed using the popular Arduino IDE. Arduino boards require no external programmer; they come with a bootloader application installed so that you can upload code via USB. Open-source libraries are widely available to speed up your development.

While typical Arduino boards use an Atmel AVR processor, there are variants that use other architectures, such as Pinguino (Microchip PIC32), Maple (ARM Cortex-M3), and Energia (MSP430). Most boards have a standard set of headers for plugging in peripheral boards called shields. In some cases, multiple shields can be stacked on top of one another, to add more and more features.